Silicon Valley

News about Silicon Valley, including commentary and archival articles published in The New York Times.

Chronology of Coverage

Mar. 25, 2015

Morgan Stanley's chief financial officer Ruth Porat is leaving to join Google, most prominent example to date of flow of major talent from Wall Street to Silicon Valley; Porat is following in footsteps of others in East Coast power positions who have recently left for rising technology industry on West Coast. MORE

Mar. 23, 2015

Big money managers like Fidelity Investments, T Rowe Price and BlackRock are buying billions of dollars worth of shares from private Silicon Valley start-ups, pooling them into mutual funds that go into retirement accounts of millions of Americans; are attracted by faster growth of private tech firms compared with companies on stock market. MORE

Mar. 5, 2015

The Upshot; many cities around the country are trying to rebrand themselves as newest high-tech innovation hub, but only those that feature a special mix of factors, like a good research university or cross-industry collaborations, are likely to compete with Silicon Valley. MORE

Feb. 27, 2015

Pentagon reveals that it sent group of high-ranking officials to Silicon Valley in December 2014 in order to solicit national security ideas from start-up firms; industry has little or no history of working with military, but officials hope it can help nation maintain technological advantage amid global turmoil. MORE

Feb. 23, 2015

High-profile harassment lawsuit going to trial has huge implications for gender issues in Silicon Valley; Ellen Pao, former employee from venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, claims she was discriminated against by firm after affair with married colleague; guilty verdict will be portrayed as indictment of high-tech industry, while dismissal could bolster rationale that gender issues are overplayed. MORE

Jan. 21, 2015

The social network is adding a feature called Recap that will show its users three top messages they missed since they last logged onto the service. MORE

Dec. 27, 2014

Joe Nocera Op-Ed column submits that unconscious bias lies behind continued dominance of while, male workers and entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley; challenges notion, advanced by some, that Silicone Valley is meritocracy, noting low percentages of black and female workers there; says it is common for people to want to be surrounded by others like themselves, and that this impulse is at work in tech industry. MORE

Nov. 24, 2014

Many immigrants in technology industry say Pres Obama's executive order on immigration falls well short of what they were seeking; industry leaders' most pressing issues, like speeding up process for obtaining permanent residency and acquiring more visas for high-skilled technology work, would require act of Congress; some immigrants say Obama's action could potentially make life and work in the United States easier. MORE

Oct. 16, 2014

Nick Bilton Disruptions column on Vanity Fair's New Establishment Summit, where Hollywood moguls and directors got a chance to mingle with venture capitalists of Silicon Valley. MORE

Oct. 7, 2014

Vivienne Harr opened a lemonade stand to end child slavery and became an Internet sensation. Her story is a reminder of the power of social media. MORE

Oct. 6, 2014

Activist investors are eager to take small stakes in big companies and call for breakups, betting that profit will follow. MORE

Aug. 21, 2014

Nick Bilton Disruptions column observes that Burning Man, arts festival in Nevada desert that was once domain of those with countercultural bent, has over last two years become annual getaway for new crop of wealthy technology moguls; some say new rich are creating sense of separation and ruining festival for everyone else. MORE

Aug. 9, 2014

Judge Lucy H Koh of United States District Court in San Jose rejects as insufficient a proposed $324 million settlement in class-action antitrust case accusing leading technology companies of agreeing not to poach one another's engineers; ruling immediately resuscitates public relations nightmare for Google, Apple and other tech companies while vindicating range of observers who had said Silicon Valley was escaping justice. MORE

Jul. 20, 2014

All the big tech industry giants participate in San Francisco's Pride Parade in effort to recode the culture in Silicon Valley to be more inclusive of gays and lesbians. MORE

Jun. 15, 2014

Claire Cain Miller It's the Economy column describes how technology companies have begun setting up research and development operations similar to those once run by AT&T and Xerox; notes part of the push to foster research and development is that big tech companies fear it is only a matter of time before next big idea puts them out of business, unless they come up with it. MORE

Jun. 9, 2014

Jun. 1, 2014

Dot-com businesses moving from Silicon Valley into San Francisco are taking over and renovating older, venerable buildings, avoiding new construction but doing little to give residents relief from high housing costs; tech firms have taken over more than three million square feet of existing office and industrial space in city. MORE

May. 3, 2014

News analysis; debate over data collection and surveillance of American citizens has shifted its focus from activities carried out by National Security Agency to practices of Silicon Valley companies; question remains whether restrictions imposed on NSA will spill over to technology industry. MORE

Apr. 13, 2014

As investment money continues to pour into Silicon Valley, start-ups already flush with cash are being given sizable additional rounds of venture capital. MORE

Apr. 11, 2014

Pacific Gas & Electric, with no apparent progress in determining who attacked an electric substation in Silicon Valley in 2013, offers $250,000 reward for information. MORE

Mar. 19, 2014

Social app Secret is testing the limits of just how much sharing Silicon Valley thinks is a good thing; sharing is done anonymously and is mostly about the ambitions, disappointments, rivalries, jealousies and obsessions of the engineers and entrepreneurs who live and work there. MORE

Mar. 16, 2014

Santa Monica and Venice, two beachfront communities in Los Angeles, are attracting Internet start-up founders for whom fund-raising and socializing are all but interchangeable; area has become so popular it has been nicknamed Silicon Beach. MORE

Mar. 2, 2014

Silicon Valley companies are increasingly paying builders to fuse their values of speed, change and productivity with their perceived corporate smarts and quirkiness; workplaces of Facebook, Twitter and Google may look whimsical, but each distinctive design is calculated to mirror its company’s values and culture. MORE

Feb. 23, 2014

How much money would it take for you to sell your start-up, quit your job or close your venture capital fund and walk away from it all? MORE

Feb. 16, 2014

Thomas L Friedman Op-Ed column contrasts attitudes among tech companies in Silicon Valley with those of a gridlocked Congress in Washington, DC; contends the best thing Washington can do is to open up export markets and reform immigration policy, in order to capitalize on the dominance of American Internet companies. MORE

Feb. 9, 2014

Jenna Wortham Bits column observes that for entrepreneurs, an overlooked target market may open broader doors to success; contends that only a slice of Silicon Valley is aware of the overlooked audiences. MORE

Feb. 6, 2014

Ro Khanna's push to unseat incumbent Michael M Honda in California's 17th Congressional District illustrates tech industry's increasing willingness to flex financial muscle in pursuit of its political goals; while both are Democrats, Khanna, who has never held elected office, has raised more than three times as much as the long-established Honda, largely through support of Silicon Valley investors and company executives. MORE

Feb. 1, 2014

Rising resentment against elite technology firms is manifesting itself in demonstrations at public bus stops in San Francisco, where private shuttle buses ferry engineers to work at campuses of Silicon Valley giants like Google, Apple, Facebook, Yahoo and eBay; buses, which illegally use city stops, have become focus of hostility among residents and an unlikely rallying point for activists. MORE

Jan. 21, 2014

Everyone wins in technology deals like Google’s $3.2 billion purchase of Nest Labs, at least until the bubble bursts, the Deal Professor writes. MORE

Nov. 27, 2013

Heady stew of technology, entrepreneurs and venture capitalists is simmering again in Silicon Valley, with Benchmark the venture capital darling of the moment; along with the rich payouts and soaring valuations, however, is an undercurrent of concern. MORE

Nov. 1, 2013

List of donors to Bill de Blasio’s campaign for New York City mayor shows growing clout of technology entrepreneurs and investors from Silicon Valley. MORE

Oct. 21, 2013

David Carr The Media Equation column on Silicon Valley's recent interest in news business; says technology industry and its various power brokers are suddenly investing significant sums of money in preserving news capacity and quality. MORE

Oct. 13, 2013

Kelleher International is a high-end matchmaking service that seeks to bring together philanthropically minded, well-heeled Silicon Valley singles. MORE

Sep. 4, 2013

San Francisco office rental company RocketSpace is responding to increasing demand for office space by tech start-ups; it is offering long tables, Internet access and rules against getting too big; technology now accounts for 75 percent of new office demand in city, compared with historical norm of 30 percent. MORE

Sep. 3, 2013

Adopting a dual-class stock structure may be bad not only for technology companies but also for their founders. MORE

Sep. 1, 2013

Jenna Wortham Bits column opines that the tech industry’s spirit of good has faded into kind of disillusionment; says it seems as if its promise--its utopian ideals and democratic aspirations--has dissolved into much more selfish pursuits of power and wealth; says promising developments or companies that do emerge are often dimmed by their flashier peers, who tend to get majority of attention. MORE

Aug. 25, 2013

Sam Biddle of Valleywag takes aim at those he finds very rich and very self-absorbed. And some find him gratuitous and simply cruel. MORE

Aug. 23, 2013

Former Defense Department and intelligence agency experts on computer vulnerabilities are heading to Silicon Valley to create technology start-ups specializing in tools aimed at thwarting online threats; more than $1 billion in venture financing poured into security start-ups in 2012. MORE

Aug. 11, 2013

Max Chafkin article profiles Scott Harrison, former vice-loving club promoter who reinvented himself as founder of non-profit charity: water, which works to provide access to clean drinking water in poor countries; Harrison is persuading many of Silicon Valley's wealthy entrepreneurs to help out in his mission. MORE

Aug. 7, 2013

Newark Mayor Cory A Booker has close ties to Silicon Valley and personally has obtained money from influential investors, like Google executive chairman Eric E Schmidt, for Booker's Internet start-up company Waywire; Booker's involvement in powerful world of high-tech underscores perception of him as an ascendent politician who understands the potential of digital world being shaped around globe. MORE

Jul. 4, 2013

Silicon Valley advocacy group FWD.us, after financing flashy television ads that drew criticism for promoting pet conservative causes, is trying to turn around its image as it prepares for fight for immigration overhaul in the House; group was created by Joe Green with financial backing from his college roommate Mark Zuckerberg. MORE

Jun. 28, 2013

Senate's passage of landmark immigration bill moves Silicon Valley companies closer to goal of importing more foreign engineers, step they say is necessary due to shortage of skilled workers; labor lobby argues that true corporate goal is to depress wages by bringing in temporary workers from overseas. MORE

Jun. 20, 2013

Technology experts and former intelligence officials say rise of data mining, both as an industry and as crucial intelligence tool, has created complex reality; both sectors hunt, often collaboratively, for ways to collect, analyze and exploit large pools of data about millions of Americans, but for vastly different reasons; Silicon Valley does it to make money, while National Security Agency does it for intelligence. MORE

Jun. 6, 2013

Countries like Canada and Australia, as Congress debates immigration, are reaching out to foreign entrepreneurs who have trouble getting temporary visas to work in United States; seductions of Silicon Valley, however, are hard to resist. MORE

Jun. 2, 2013

Sometimes, tech entrepreneurs create companies best appreciated by other people who live and breathe technology. MORE

May. 20, 2013

Technology industry is pushing to amend immigration bill, saying it imposes too much regulatory control over company's hiring of temporary foreign workers or laying off Americans; results of Silicon Valley's efforts could shape fate of overall package and also fate of millions of immigrants entering United States. MORE

May. 12, 2013

Esther Gokhale of Palo Alto, Calif, is posture guru of Silicon Valley; she teaches people who sit and work at desks and computers all day about basic posture to avoid back pain; her courses are offered in her studio and in cities across the country. MORE

May. 5, 2013

Silicon Valley companies and their executives are waging sophisticated lobbying campaign in support of immigration overhaul; push is motivated in part by desire to tap pool of highly skilled foreign-born engineers. MORE

May. 3, 2013

Approval of new corporate jet center in San Jose, Calif, is latest symbol for rapidly growing gap between region's haves, with their private jets and untold wealth, and have-nots, clinging to more modest lives in dwindling number of communities they can afford; underscores how tech boom throughout Silicon Valley is leaving many behind. MORE

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